The Land of Promise Part 23

She managed a "Yes."

She had only just recovered her self-control as they drove into Winnipeg. As they drew up in front of the princ.i.p.al hotel, Taylor turned the reins once more over to Reggie, and, vaulting lightly from his seat, held out his hand and helped her to alight.

"You'd better go into the ladies' parlor for a minute or two. I'm feeling generous and am going to blow Reg to a parting drink. I'll come after you in a minute and take you to the Y. W. C. A."

"Very well."

"Here," he called, as she turned toward the door marked Ladies'

Entrance, "aren't you going to say good-by to Reg?"

For a moment she almost lost her hardly regained self-control. To say good-by to Reg was the final wrench. She had known him in those immeasurably far-off days at home. It was saying good-by to England. She held out her hand without speaking.

"Good-by, Miss Marsh," he said warmly, "and good luck."

A quarter of an hour later Taylor came to her in the stuffy little parlor of which she was the solitary tenant. In silence they made their way to the building occupied by the Y. W. C. A.

"You have money?" he asked as they reached the door.

"Plenty, thanks."

"Do you want me to come in with you?"

"It isn't necessary."

"What time shall I come for you to-morrow?"

"At whatever time you choose."

"Shall we say ten, then? Or eleven might be better. I've got to get the license, you know, and look up the parson."

"Very good; at eleven."

"Good night, Nora."

"Good night, Frank."

Nora's first impulse on being shown to a room was to go at once to bed.

Mind and body both cried out for rest. But she remembered that she had eaten nothing since noon. She would need all her strength for the morrow. She supposed they would start at once for Taylor's farm after they were married.

Good G.o.d, since the world began had any woman ever trapped herself so completely as she had done! But she must not think of that.

She had not the most remote idea where the farm was. All she remembered to have heard was that it was west of Winnipeg, miles farther than her brother's. One couldn't drive to it, it was necessary to take the train.

But whether it was a day's journey or a week's journey, she had never been interested enough to ask. After all, what could it possibly matter where it was; the farther away from everybody and everything she had ever known, the better.

The sound of a gong in the hall below recalled her thoughts to the matter of supper. She went down to a bare little dining-room, only partly filled, and accepted silently the various dishes set before her all at one time. She had never seen a dinner--or supper, they probably called it--served in such a haphazard fas.h.i.+on.

Even at Gertie's--she smiled wanly at the thought that since the morning she no longer thought of it as her brother's, but as Gertie's--while such a thing as a dinner served in courses had probably never been heard of by anyone but Reggie, her brother and herself, the few simple, well-cooked dishes bore some relation to each other, and the supply was always ample. Gertie was justly proud of her reputation as a good provider.

But here there was a sort of mockery of abundance. Dabs of vegetables, sauces, preserves, meats, both hot and cold, in cheap little china dishes fairly elbowed each other for room. It would have dulled a keener appet.i.te than poor Nora's.

Having managed to swallow a cup of weak tea and a piece of heavy bread, she went once more to her room and sat down by the window which looked out on what she took to be one of the princ.i.p.al streets of the town.

Tired as she still was, she felt not the slightest inclination for sleep. The thought of lying there, wakeful, in the dark, filled her with terror. For the first time in her life, Nora was frightened. She pressed her face against the window to watch the infrequent pa.s.sers-by. Surely none of them could be as unhappy as she. Like a hideous refrain, over and over in her head rang the words:

"Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

At length, unable to bear it any longer, the now empty street offering no distraction, she undressed and went to bed, hoping for relief in sleep. But sleep would not be wooed. She tossed from side to side, always hearing those maddening words:

"Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

All sorts of impractical schemes tormented her feverish brain. She would appeal to the manager of the place. She was a woman. She would understand. She would do any work, anything, for her bare keep. Take care of the rooms, wait on table, anything. Then the thought came to her of how Gertie would gloat to hear--and she would be sure to do so, things always got out--that she was now doing _her_ old work. No, she could not bear that.

Perhaps, if she started out very early, she could get a position in some shop. There must be plenty of shops in a place the size of Winnipeg. But what would she say when asked what experience she had had? No; that, too, seemed hopeless.

As a last resort, she thought of throwing herself on Taylor's mercy. She would explain to him that she had been mad with anger; that she hadn't in the least realized what she was doing; that her only thought had been to defy Gertie in the hour of her triumph. Surely no man since the days of the cave-men would prize an unwilling wife. She would humbly confess that she had used him and beg his pardon, if necessary, on her knees.

But what if he refused to release her from her promise? And what if he did release her? What then? There still remained the unsolvable problem of what she was to do. Her brother had told her that positions in Winnipeg during the winter months were impossible to get. Gertie had taunted her with the same fact. She had less than six dollars in the world. After she had paid her bill she would have little more than four.

It was hopeless.

"Trapped, trapped, trapped, by your own mad temper, trapped!"

And then more plans; each one kindling fresh hope in her heart only to have it extinguished, like a torch thrown into a pool, when they proved, on a.n.a.lysis, each to be more impracticable than its predecessor. And then, the refrain. And then, more plans.

It was a haggard and weary-looking bride that presented herself to the expectant bridegroom the next morning. The great circles under her eyes told the story of a sleepless night. But nothing in Taylor's manner betrayed that he noticed that she was looking otherwise than as usual.

While she was dressing, Nora had come to a final decision. Quite calmly and unemotionally she would explain the situation to him. She would point out the impossibility, the absurdity even, of keeping an agreement entered into, by one of the parties at least, in hot blood, and thoroughly repented of, on later and saner reflection. In the remote event of this unanswerable argument failing to move him, she would appeal to his honor as a man not to hold her, a woman, to so unfair a bargain. She had even prepared the well-balanced sentences with which she would begin.

But as she stood with her cold hand in his warm one, he forestalled her by exhibiting, not without a certain boyish pride, the marriage license and the plain gold band which was to bind her. If these familiar and rather commonplace objects had been endowed with some evil magic, they could not have deprived her of the power of speech more effectively.

Without a protest, she permitted herself to be led to the waiting carriage, provided in honor of the occasion. It seemed but a moment later that she found herself being warmly embraced by a motherly looking woman, who, it transpired, was the wife of the clergyman who had just performed the ceremony.

From the parsonage they drove directly to the station.

CHAPTER XI

The journey had seemed endless: it was already nightfall when they arrived at the town of Prentice, where they were to get off and drive some twelve miles farther to her new home. And yet, endless and unspeakably wearying as it was, her heart contracted to find that it was at an end.

She realized now how comfortable, even luxurious, her trip across the Continent had been by comparison. Then, she had traveled in a Pullman.

This, she learned, was called a day-coach. Her husband did everything in his power to mitigate the rigors of the trip. He made a pillow for her with his coat, bought her fruits, candies and magazines from the train-boy, until she protested. Best of all, he divined and respected her disinclination for conversation. At intervals during the day he left her to go into the smoking-car to enjoy his pipe.

The view from the window was, on the whole, rather monotonous. But it would have had to be varied indeed to match the mental pictures that Nora's flying thoughts conjured up for her.

The dead level of her life at Tunbridge Wells had been a curious preparation for the violent changes of the last few months. How often when walking in the old-world garden with Miss Wickham she had had the sensation of stifling, oppressed by those vine-covered walls, and inwardly had likened herself to a prisoner. There were no walls now to confine her. Clear away to the sunset it was open. And yet she was more of a prisoner than she had ever been. And now she wore a fetter, albeit of gold, on her hand.

It had been her habit to think of herself with pity as friendless in those days; forgetful of the good doctor and his wife, Agnes Pringle and even Mr. Wynne, not to speak of her humbler friends, the gardener's wife and children, and the good Kate. Well, she was being punished for it now. It would be hard, indeed, to imagine a more friendless condition than hers. Rus.h.i.+ng onward, farther and farther into the wilderness to make for herself a home miles from any human habitation; no woman, in all probability, to turn to in case of need. And, crowning loneliness, having ever at her side a man with whom she had been on terms of open enmity up to a few short hours before!